Just how big?

That is a 45. Now that really takes me back. The 45s had a larger hole than the long playing, or LP, records. In your photo, someone has added an adapter to play it on your phonograph. They also made an adapter that would fit over the spindle of the phonograph to also play 45s. They were much cheaper than an LP and the quality of the LPs were much better also.

GSS said:

I guess any Bing Crosby Christmas album song will be my favorite.
Watching the 33 record spin on our old RCA Victor with the snake arm with eyes was a favorite

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Bing Crosby was a very versatile and multi-talented guy--did so much--and in the days before internet and also before television, for that matter--was not so easy to do back then, to reach out to millions of people!

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bing_Crosby

B. Crosby by singing Let it snow
and

Don't forget Perry Como

paul1598419 said:

That is a 45. Now that really takes me back. The 45s had a larger hole than the long playing, or LP, records. In your photo, someone has added an adapter to play it on your phonograph. They also made an adapter that would fit over the spindle of the phonograph to also play 45s. They were much cheaper than an LP and the quality of the LPs were much better also.

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Spot on Paul.
It's a 45 and indeed there's an adaptor included with my record player in case the record needs it.
And yes, I've heard the quality is not as good as the LPs.

:beer:

Encap said:

Bing Crosby was a very versitile and multi-talented guy--did so much--and in the days before internet and also before television, for that mater--was not so easy to do back then, to reach out to millions of people!

Click to expand...

Exactly and I think I heard that his single "White Christmas" is one of an all time top selling singles.
We have a tradition in our family that we watch "White Christmas" around Christmas time.
It's the closest we get to Snow at Christmas. :crackup:

I never knew just to how far his talents went and it's sad to when I hear his name now, the first thing I think of his all the accusations of his children's abuse
RB, nice grab of the records
Going back to the old RCA Victor, as a kid I sure did put it threw its paces. I had a blast playing the 33 LP's at 45 speed and then the other way around. Also had some Chimpmunk Christmas Albums that were even funnier to play at faster speed
I remember the 45 spacers sometimes being yellow, and still kinda amazed that the spindle adapter worked pretty well when being stacked with records and automaticly dropping to the next.
Those were the days when your local pharmacy had the displays with replacement needle's next to Timex displays and Cross pens etc. Good old days:can:

My Yeti knock-off (ZaZa) was marked down to $5.

I am betting if you filled it with snow and sent the fastest way to RB it *might* still be snow when he gets it.. w/o any additional ice -dry ice etc.. just a lot of styro around and overnight ship..add 4 or 5 lbs of dry ice and it will be frozen.. for several days.

or-- send him a kids snowcone maker.. cheap at yard sales and I have seen lots of them..

We had a fishing/hunting cabin up in Ontario--during the winter deer hunt the french river was frozen-- we used to cut blocks of ice from the river until the 'ice house' was full- it was 80% buried and filled with sawdust--AND all the way until the Fall cold returned we had ice. I think this is how it was done long before freezers.

RB astro said:

Spot on Paul.
It's a 45 and indeed there's an adaptor included with my record player in case the record needs it.
And yes, I've heard the quality is not as good as the LPs.

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This is partly true.

The issue with records is that the turntable has a constant angular velocity, but the outer tracks are much larger than the inner ones.

The outermost track(s) on a 33 rpm LP may have higher fidelity compared to a 45 rpm single, but the inner ones certainly do not.

To get the maximum fidelity these is the 12" single: an LP sized vinyl record that spins at 45 rpm but uses the outermost part of the disc to get maximum linear velocity. This format was (and to some degree still is) popular in the DJ scene, though it's objctive performance is no match to that of even the simpest CD.

I think it also had something to do with the process of pressing the vinyl 45 records. It was done very cheaply back in the days when 45s were popular. A 45 record might cost you 50 cents new back in the day.

The material used is important for the durability and thus quality of the record over time.

The typical material is vinyl (or shellac somwhere when 78 rpm records were used), but that does not define every property. It also has to do with the quality of the pressing process, purity of the plastic and such.

Vinyl is not the only option though, more durable materials can be used such as polycarbonate, which was the solution to making things like transparent discs. I guess one could use even more wear resistant materials like glass, but that would wear down the stylus more quickly.

IDK, glass has a hardness of about 6-7 on the Mohs scale and the styli are made of synthetic corundum with a hardness of 9. So, if someone actually used glass to press the records with, I doubt it would wair too much on the stylus. I can't see glass as being a viable medium for this purpose, though.

Glass would probably be too brittle for consumer applications, but for records that play back often without being handeled much (like background music systems) it could be viable.

It would be interesting to see how this works though, two fairly hard materials like glass and sapphire running along eachother. Perhaps it'd just make a terrible noise and not be usable at all.

Wear would be a problem i think though: even playing back those very soft pvc records the stylus needed to be replaced once in a while.

Scratching two materials together will not mean the harder one will not be damaged at all, it just happens more slowly the bigger the difference is. Hardened steel bits even go blunt when drilling copper or aluminium, despite having a hardness like 7.5 against 3-ish for aluminium or copper.